In the floor of the cupboard there was a trap
door which led down into another dark cupboard below, and from
there a passage led to the cellar. So that, should the house be
searched, any one in the upper rooms could slip into the cupboard,
from there reach the cellar, and thus escape. Here the regicides
now took up their abode. And so well was their secret kept that
they lived there for ten or fifteen years, their presence being
unsuspected even by the inhabitants of the little town.
Henceforth the world was dead to them, and they were dead to the world.
They were both soldiers. On many a field of battle,-Gainsborough,
Marston, Naseby, Worcester, and Dunbar,-they had led their men to
victory. They had been Members of Parliament, friends of the Great
Protector, and had taken part in all the doings of these stirring
times.
Now all that was over. Now no command, no power was left to them.
The years went by, dragging their slow length of days, and bringing
no change or brightness to the lives of these two men who lived
in secret and alone. It was a melancholy life, the monotony only
broken by visits from the minister, or a few other friends, who
brought them all the gossip and news of the town. These were but
small matters. But to the two men shut off from all other human
beings they seemed of rare interest.
After ten years Whalley died.
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